


Still avoiding tomorrow

by Trash



Category: Bastille (Band)
Genre: Anxiety, Drug Use, General dan-ness, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-04
Updated: 2019-09-04
Packaged: 2020-10-10 00:27:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20518955
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trash/pseuds/Trash
Summary: Reading Festival is different, this time round.





	Still avoiding tomorrow

They're in the dressing room, a glorified portacabin, the pair of them crowded round the bong. It's a bright pink, plastic affair. Seven quid from one of the stalls selling hydroponics under the counter. He also, inexplicably, bought a hexagon shaped grinder. 

"Got some incense too," Dan says as Charlie lights the weed.

"Sensible."

There's nothing but the sound of bubbles from the bong for a minute. Charlie exhales, a long stream of smoke, coughs, passes the bong to Dan.

"It's a bit different, this time, isn't it?"

Dan had been thinking the same thing, with no idea how to articulate it. Different for sure. Not just the festival, but the band too. Three years ago it would have been him and Kyle getting baked before the show.

("You sure?"

"I need to quiet my stupid brain before I go out there. It's fine, really.")

Now Kyle is who knows where with the others. And it's fine. It is. He made this decision. Made his bed. Now he'll lie in it. Sure, sure sure sure.

It's fine.

And okay. So maybe he gets a bit higher than he intended to. And maybe when he goes to stand up his legs don't get the message and he pretty much just falls over. Charlie has the foresight to grab the bong before he goes down like a sack of shit, thankfully.

He lies on the floor laughing hysterically. And Charlie is giggling above him going "You okay, mate?"

(No.) "Yes."

***

He slurs his way through the show. Pretty sure he gets away with it. Mostly anyway. Enough. Afterwards Kyle takes his hand and looks at him closely. "You are ruined."

"Mmm."

His hand is warm, rough calluses on the inside of his knuckles from drumming. Dan knows these hands like his own. Knows the way they feel against his skin. Knows how he’d shiver, now, if Kyle put those hands on his collar bone. That one place that doesn’t seem to work with anyone else (read: Charlie). 

“This isn’t good, Dan. Isn’t good for you.”

“Not your problem now,” Dan says, as calmly as he can manage. Doesn’t want to start a fight, doesn’t want to have to think about anything Kyle-related. Because it hurts. Even though he did the doing. The doing being – fucking up so exponentially Kyle no longer wanted to be around him. Drugs, mostly. But also, you know, The Affair. With Charlie.

(“It isn’t working.”

“Well no, not now that you’ve ridden someone else.”)

Kyle’s face softens, and he lets go. “You’re still my friend, Dan. I’m just worried.”

And Dan wants to throw up. Because he doesn’t deserve that worry, now, does he? He doesn’t deserve Kyle’s unwavering love even if it’s different now. Changed shape. 

“I’m fine,” he says, tightly. Forces himself to smile, hopes it isn’t just a grimace.

(It is.)


End file.
